# Building the Universal Commerce Protocol

DevFeed: [Building the Universal Commerce Protocol](<https://devfeed.tech/articles/building-the-universal-commerce-protocol-1653.md>)

Original publisher: [Read original article](<https://shopify.engineering/ucp>)

Author: Ilya Grigorik

Published: 2026-01-11T14:17:01Z

Content type: article

Language: en

Sources: [Shopify Engineering](<https://devfeed.tech/sources/shopify-engineering.md>), [Shopify Engineering - Shopify Engineering](<https://devfeed.tech/sources/shopify-engineering-shopify-engineering.md>)

Topics: [AI Bots](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/ai-bots.md>)

Tags: [agentic](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/agentic.md>), [ai-agents](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/ai-agents.md>), [apis](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/apis.md>), [architecture](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/architecture.md>), [extensions](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/extensions.md>)

## AI overview

Shopify describes UCP, an open protocol for AI agents to discover merchant capabilities, negotiate supported actions, and complete commerce transactions.

## Source excerpt

We built UCP to power agentic commerce. Here's the architecture behind it.